Featured project · 2024
Palisade House
A timber-and-glass house on a sloped waterfront site, arranged as three split volumes that follow the grade rather than fight it.
- Location
- Bainbridge Island, WA
- Area
- 312 m²
- Status
- Built
- Scope
- New build · full design
Three to start with
Featured work.
How we work
Four steps, walked in order.
Survey
Site, climate, context and brief. We walk the ground before we draw a line — usually several times.
Concept
One idea, tested hard. The concept phase ends with a single diagram we can defend in any room.
Drawing
The building is designed backwards from how it will be maintained. Details first, then the whole.
Building
We stay on site through construction. The drawings are a plan, not a promise; the building is the truth.
Studio notes
From the journal.
Why We Walk the Site Before We Draw a Line
A short defence of the studio habit that costs the most time and saves the most money: getting there, on foot, before anything else.
Our Best Architectural Tool Is a Spreadsheet of Failures
Every leak, stain and stubborn door in our built work is logged, dated and reviewed. This is what we learned.
An Open Letter About Public Bathrooms and Civic Dignity
The smallest public buildings carry the largest share of civic dignity. Our Tidepool project taught us what happens when they are done right.
New project
Have a site, an idea, or a problem?
Tell us a few honest details and we will come walk the ground. The first conversation is free and the advice is straight.